


What It Costs

by tymedfire



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Future, Angst, Future Fic, Gen, Hurt No Comfort, Implied/Referenced Torture, One Shot, Scar reveal, Team as Family, This hurt to write but I had to, This is emotional yall, War, lance is Emotional
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-23
Updated: 2018-04-23
Packaged: 2019-04-27 00:39:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,167
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14413917
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tymedfire/pseuds/tymedfire
Summary: Lance couldn’t believe what he was hearing; his brother was actually jealous of him fighting a war in space? For real?





	What It Costs

“You think this job is glorious? You’re seriously jealous of me right now?” Lance couldn’t believe what he was hearing; his brother was actually jealous of him fighting a war in space?  _ For real _ ?

“Yes! We’ve been here, left behind, while you go gallivanting around space, seeing and doing more than no human ever has before, and now you come back and expect me to be  _ happy _ that you’re back here, telling us all about your amazing adventures and what a  _ great _ time you’ve been having away from your family-”

“Javier!” Mama interrupted him, but before she could say anything else, something in Lance snapped.

“You think I  _ wanted _ to leave you all behind? All this--what did you call it?-- fame and fortune, you wish you had that, is that it? You wish it had been you that Blue took home, yeah?”

“Yes!” Javier practically screamed. Half of Lance’s family flinched at the vehemence in his voice compared to Lances quiet, but steadily rising, temper. Nobody knew what to say. “Someone who would stay in contact! Someone who deserves all of that!”

“You want that? Well, that’s a lie! It’s embellished, all of it!” Mama gasped. Javier’s lip twisted, but Lance cut him off before he could speak. “All that stuff I’ve told you, it’s only a tiny portion of what went on up there. You really want to be a paladin, you gotta know what it costs, because ‘paladin’ isn’t some fancy title, Javier, it’s a  _ job _ . It means soldier. Up there isn’t all space mall trips and finding interesting creatures, it’s a  _ war _ . Do you get that? It’s not fun. It’s terrifying and it’s hard,” Lance fumed. He couldn’t find it in himself to stop, everything he bottled up about his time away to protect his family coming out. “You know what being a paladin costs?  _ This _ .” Lance shed his jacket and reached back to pull the long sleeve shirt he’d worn since coming back to Earth over his head.

He heard several gasps as the shirt hit the floor. He stood there for a second, letting his family, but most importantly, Javier, take in his scarred torso. 

Never taking his eyes off his brother, Lance pointed to the burn scar that traveled up his chest and across his shoulder. “This is the first scar I got in space. It happened about three Earth days after we got to the castle when the Galra blew up the crystal that runs the ship. I noticed what was about to happen and pulled Coran out of the way of the blast. I saved his life.” He pointed to a glob of scar tissue on his side, below his ribs. “I got this trying to shield Pidge from a shot pointed at her back while she was retrieving data from a Galra ship. Either the gun was too strong or the soldier was too close, or both, because the shot went straight through my armor and Pidges, too. She has one just like this.” He pointed at the scar lining his wrist. “I’m Voltron’s sniper. I got this when nobody was watching my six and a soldier, not Galra, hit me on the head and snapped my wrists, both of them, to keep me from aiding my team. Most of the rest are from the three times in the past years that I’ve been captured by an enemy. Only one of those times was Galra. Not a single one of us  _ hasn’t _ been captured at some point. And it’s not just a ‘we’re gonna keep you out of the way for a while, here, have some lemonade’ type of thing. We get tortured.  _ I’ve _ been tortured, more than once. Shiro nearly lost his fucking mind because the Druids experiments on him messed him up so badly. That’s what happens in a war. But none of those are the worst.”

Lance held up his hands, palms facing Javier’s stunned face. He stood, frozen, and stared at Lance the entire time he talked.

“ _ This _ ,” he snarled, “is the worst part. I’m not innocent in any of this. These are hands that have killed. These are hands that put a gun to a Galra officers head-”

The fingers of Lance’s right hand formed a gun while his other remained up, as if in submission. He brought the tips of his fingers to rest between Javier’s wide, petrified eyes.

“-and shot and killed him, right where he stood.”

His whole arm jerked back as if reacting to the kickback of a gun. Javier jumped. 

“These are hands that set off a bomb that killed an entire ship of living, breathing souls. These are hands that strangled someone to death because she was hurting Keith and I didn’t have any weapons, there was nothing, not even gravity, and I couldn’t think of any other way to save him.” Spit and tears hit Javier’s face, and Lance took a second to wonder when he had started crying.

“ _ This _ , Javier, this is what war costs. It costs you your humanity and your soul and your innocence, even when you think you don’t have any left. When you think you’re so  _ mature _ and nothing could phase you, and then see someone literally rip a person's heart from their chest, and more, until there’s barely anything left. It’s keeping your temper in check while standing in a room and working with people who have killed and tortured people you love because now they can help. It’s nightmares and pain and loss. That’s not something that I went to space knowing, but now it’s something that I choose, because if fighting in this war gets rid of these types of people, and allows you and everybody else to keep your souls, then it’s  _ worth it _ .” 

He let out a humorless laugh. “It’s finally,  _ finally _ coming home, knowing that you’re going to have to go back because it’s not finished, and being relieved because of it, because it’s not safe, but it’s familiar. More familiar than the place you grew up. It’s becoming so ridiculously codependent on the five people you’ve basically shared a mind with for years, that even a few days apart is almost unbearable. I’ve been here for three days and I’ve talked to at least two of them every night, and all I wanna do is go back to them. It’s like a physical ache when I’m not with any of them.” Lance’s eyes, which had drifted down to the ground, snapped back to Javier. “ _ That’s _ what being a paladin is, Javi. Now look at me and tell me you want that, too.”

Silence reigned for an entire minute before Lance’s phone rang. He pulled it out and had to smile. “It’s also being so in-tune with each other, even from so far away, that they know when you’re too worked up.” With that said, Lance answered, walking out the back door and onto the beach to Shiro’s concerned voice asking what was wrong.


End file.
